The Twelve Days of Christmas
by RUXIS
Summary: Ever since the Christmas season came around, Kagura's been feeling down about not spending it with her family until something she never would have expected begins to unfold.


If there were ever a holiday that Kagura could call her favorite; she would pick Christmas before anything else. Back home, she'd never celebrated such a holiday. This was due part to, obviously, her home being an alien planet far different from Earth, but also because her family was always incredibly poor so that any holiday was impossible to celebrate. Granted, her social status on Earth wasn't much to brag about either, she could attest to the fact that here she had much more of a family than she ever did as a young girl.

Still, even all the people in Edo weren't enough to replace the real thing. Kamui was a massive jerk so she couldn't even bring herself to find a glimmer of hope that perhaps a Christmas miracle would occur and he'd show up. Her mother was long dead so there was no point in even thinking about that one, and her father...Well, Umibouzu had his moments of showing up unexpectedly every few months. Maybe she was just feeling a bit disheartened but she wasn't planning on seeing him either. After all, he had sent her a letter recently stating he was going to be incredibly busy for the upcoming weeks.

From December 1st onwards, those thoughts played on repeat in her head like a broken record of Radioactive playing over and over. Sure, it was okay the first couple of times but after hearing it nonstop for thirteen days straight you wanted to stop imagining dragons, or in this case, your distant family.

Gintoki and Shinpachi were no idiots either; they caught on quickly to what was troubling her. Who could blame her? Any girl her age would feel the same without a doubt. Kagura had accidentally overheard the two discussing ideas on how to cheer her up, or rather heard Shinpachi ask Gintoki if he had any ideas to which he brushed off by saying, "She'll be over it come the new year. Get her some Midol for a present and we can just lay low until it's safe." Perhaps her choice in not confiding in them was a smart one after all.

Sitting on a park bench with Sadaharu on the evening of December 13th, she found herself unable to start brooding over the same problem until her oversized pet started going bat shit over something she couldn't see as all dogs really like to do.

"What's wrong, Sadaharu," she asked him while barely struggling to keep a hold on his leash while he pulled away, "There some girlie dog near? Don't leave me for that skank! She's probably sniffed the butt of every other dog in town; girls and boys! You could do much better." Even so, despite her protests Sadaharu insisted on continuing wigging out.

To her surprise, Sadaharu managed to pull hard enough that the leash snapped and her arm recoiled and she smacked herself in the face. While rubbing her nose, she noticed the mammoth sized animal take off to god knows what. "Sadaharu! If that girlie dog wants to go on the Maury show after this you can only blame yourself!" She yelled after him. He'd be back in a few minutes, she didn't want to see what dog breeding looked like anyways. Gotta give the pooch privacy where privacy was deserved.

But after several minutes, there was still no sign of him returning. Out of nowhere, she heard some loud screaming and barking. A few seconds later both stopped.

Dog mating must've been really weird.

Moments after, Sadaharu finally came bounding back as she suspected that he would and spat out an unidentified object in front of her. Though it was a bloody mess, the feathers were a clear indication that it had once been a bird. "Sadaharu, Christmas isn't for another twelve days you-" She stopped herself short upon realizing something. "Sadaharu show me where you found this bird," she commanded him excitedly to which he gave a playful yip in response.

The white haired beast lead her to a section of the park that was undergoing renovation. Just as she had suspected, someone had planted a tree that she had never seen there before. "You know what this means, right?!" She grinned brightly at the mighty member of nature, "We're going to have free food!" While she would have prefered a tree that gave pickled seaweed, pears would do too. How did the other eleven days of Christmas go again? She'd only heard it a couple of times when she was first trying to learn how to speak Japanese. She just remembered she got cool stuff and cool stuff was always welcomed.

"Come on, Sadaharu! We gotta wait for tomorrow to see what we get next!"


End file.
